A few days ago, I turned forty-two. While this may not seem significant to most people… okay, it didn’t seem particularly significant to me, either. I’m not big into birthdays. Last year, I was in England on my birthday. In fact, I was riding a bike. I was so busy touring and riding and dealing with my trip that I didn’t notice that I had turned forty-one until two days after my birthday.

This year, The Handsome Man was sick, The Boy was gone, and I was left to hang-out with The New Pup, who was not especially cognizant of my supposed Big Day. My present was late arriving in the mail, so essentially my birthday passed without much acknowledgment. I didn’t particularly care.

No really, I wasn’t hurt. It was no big deal. You shouldn’t feel bad about it. Seriously. I mean it.

Three days later, my present arrived, and last weekend, I was finally able to strap it onto the bike and head out for a ride. The Adorable Pup was supervised, the kids were gone… the only problem remained the weather.

And for once, I’m not talking about bitter blasts of frozen rain or malicious mists or even dank overcast skies. I’m not bemoaning gusty headwinds. No, the problem here is so unusual, so startling, that I hardly know how to describe it. The reason I hesitated to take my bike out into the wild is that it was…

Too. Darn. Hot.

Yes, you read that correctly. I know, we’re hardly talking the scorching temperatures of the southern states here. We’re not even talking the muggy humidity of Portland on a warm day. But it was over 90 degrees in the shade, and let’s face it, at some point the weather just swings far enough to the other side to push even the most stoical of Seattle residents into a sweat-covered state of apathy. If we can’t wear fleece, my god, people, how can we function?

Anyway, I ignored the heat and bravely set out at midday to take in the entirety of the Cedar River Trail’s paved portion, which extends 14 miles. It was very, very warm. I kept thinking that the river trail would be cooler than it was up at my house (why I was thinking this is a mystery to me in retrospect, as we’re up on top of a hill where cool breezes blow year-round, and the trail is down in a valley, but you know how illogical I can be). I seemed to recall long stretches of shade. I was partially correct in this remembrance: there are stretches of shade, punctuated by much longer stretches of bare asphalt and bitterness.

At any rate, I was really there to try out the new bag.

In selecting a new bag for The Gazelle Champion Mondial, I wanted something relatively small, but not as small as The Raleigh’s wee saddlebag. The Champion Mondial thinks baskets look dorky on it. It’s a fast bike, relative to the other two I own, and it wants something more sporty.

I spent far more time considering this than I wanted to. There is an absolute paucity of small bags out there. Oh sure, there are saddle wedges, but those are too small. I needed to be able to put a camera in there, my purse, a small repair kit, and a jacket. The Raleigh’s wee bag barely holds my camera. But a bag like the Carradice Barley, which I’ve owned before, would be far too large for my day-ride purposes. So what to do?

I settled on the Carradice Junior, which is the smallest bag they make that still met my minimum needs. To me, it’s a bit on the big side, but I had few choices. I sent a link to The Birthday Present Guy and he ordered it for me.

I bought the black and cream version, as the green/tan one didn’t seem like it would look as good with The Gazelle’s yellow-gold paint. When it arrived, I was once again struck by the quality of Carradice bags. It’s beautifully made, with tight seams and stiffly waxed fabric.

Guess I won’t be covering it with buttons anytime soon (that would, I realized, make the waterproofing pointless). Perhaps at some point, I’ll put one or two on the light strap, since I have no need of a blinky.

The interior is, as I said, a bit big for my purposes, but I’ll survive.

This shot includes: my purse, a replacement tube, my full repair kit, and my camera bag. I had room for a coat, gloves, snacks and anything else I might require. It’s a pretty darn big bag. The little rack on The Gazelle works nicely to stabilize the bag and support it.

It didn’t seem to slow me down with enormous rear-end drag or anything.

In fact, the only thing slowing me down on this ride was the fact that it was rather like riding through a furnace. There was very little shade (contrary to these pictures. I wasn’t stopping in the hottest places), and by about mile 12 on the way out, I was pretty pooped. Now, normally adding 4-5 more miles to my ride and knowing I’d completed the trail would be no big deal, but in this case, I decided that heat was simply too much. I turned around and headed back.

Two more memorable events occurred when I was essentially done with my ride. A mile or so before the end of the trail, there’s a small grocery. I popped in and grabbed a fudge bar, then headed next door to a small park with a gazebo, hoping for the cool. There was an older couple there, with their two grandchildren out trying to hit a baseball to each other. I sat down in the gazebo at the other table, and smiled at the old man across from me.

“Nice day,” he commented, and I agreed. “We came here to get away from the crowds,” he said. I noted that the small park was indeed, not crowded.

“Don’t like the crowds at the other parks these days, if you know what I mean.”

I stared at him. I was pretty sure I did know what he meant, but was really, really hoping I was mistaken.

“Yeah,” I said pointedly, “those kids with their loud radios and such are really annoying.”

“Oh no… I don’t mean them.” He was nervously conspiratorial now. I had a real desire to get up and walk away. He looked vaguely like a redneck Santa Clause, in red suspenders and with a big white beard. I sighed internally as he continued: “I mean… there’s too many Somalis and Mexicans, you know? They’ve just taken over everything. I don’t mean to be prejudice, but…”

I narrowed my eyes. “Can’t say I agree with that, but the parks are crowded on sunny days, I suppose.”

He gave me a smile and at that moment, his granddaughter came over to ask for money for a fudge bar of her own. His OBVIOUSLY MIXED-RACE granddaughter.

I left.

Back on the trail, I headed over the trestle bridge. I’ve photographed this bridge numerous times.

That’s it about a month ago. It goes right over the Cedar River, about 40 feet above the water. There are signs clearly posted on it reminding folks not to jump in the water. Now, it was hot. Did I mention that it was hot? The river was packed with people, paddling, intertubing and swimming. As I rode over the trestle, I saw a group of men standing on the other side of the guard rail. The wrong side. Down below, a woman was standing in the water and shouting up: “Let him do it if he wants to!”

Let’s reread that, shall we: “A woman was standing in the water,” encouraging her friend/lover/greatest enemy to jump down into the water from 40 feet over her head. The waist-deep water.

I rode another half a block and called the cops. “They’re what?” the operator said.

“Jumping off the Cedar River trestle into the river. It didn’t seem like a very good idea to me,” I noted, “as my tax-dollars will pay to treat their paralysis.”

She gave a wry laugh. “Yep, not a good idea at all. Patrol cars are on their way.”

I saw them as I drove home. I was covered in a thin veneer of sweat and nausea from too much heat and casual racism and stupidity. But hey, the bag was very useful. So happy birthday to me!

I like goals. I will admit to being just slightly result-driven. I like to see where I’m headed, and work to get there. I’m a big-picture, plan-it-out, hyphenate-everything kinda gal. That said, some goals just seem too lofty, too drenched in the heavens and hangin’ out with the angels to be reached by us mere mortals. Riding across the I-90 bridge seemed like that sort of goal to me.

First off, some background for those of you who don’t live here in Drizzletopia: the I-90 bridge runs between Bellevue and Seattle, connecting the two sides of Lake Washington by way of Mercer Island, a rather significant land mass in the middle of the lake. We have two bridges across the lake, but the other one doesn’t have a bike lane. Lake Washington is no small shakes: this is a substantial body of water, requiring quite a trek should one wish to drive around it. In fact, the Lake Washington Loop, which is part purpose-built trail and part street navigation around the lake, is nearly 52 miles long.

Biking (or running) across the bridge is a popular commuter activity, but hardly something most people consider a life-goal. I am, as most of you probably already know, not really like most people in many respects, my affection for heavy steel three-speeds among them. And it was that very proclivity for monstrously heavy bicycles that caused me to doubt my ability to traverse the lake. You see, to get to the trailhead for the trip across the bridge, I would either have to drive the ten miles north from Renton, or ride them. Did I mention that those ten miles are pretty dang hilly?

Per example, from a previous Raleigh-driven escapade:

I can never really print that picture enough, you know? Anyway.

By the time I reached Bellevue on my previous attempts, I was generally a sweaty mess. And considering the ride back features those same hills, only in reverse, the idea of adding another nearly ten miles in each direction across the bridge just didn’t appeal to me. I know, I could have driven up and parked near the trailhead, but where’s the fun in that?

So I didn’t do the bridge. But I really, really wanted to.

Then last week, I decided to take a sunny Tuesday morning ride over to Bellevue on the new Gazelle Champion Mondial. The ride from Renton to Bellevue is very pretty in its own right.

The aptly named Lake Washington Loop follows the lake for the most part from Renton all the way to a middling suburb known as Newcastle, where it joins up with an actual bike trail for a brief period, paralleling the freeway. This part is a bit less scenic.

For those who survive the assault of their ears by I-405, which is the freeway this trail follows, the trail quickly pops out onto the road again in a lovely stretch of leafy green beauty and that truly hideous hill.

And here’s where something began to dawn on me: riding a bike that weighs at least ten pounds less than my three-speed, has seven additional gears (including a heck of a granny gear), and that isn’t encumbered by a basket on one side… allows me to climb hills more easily.

Stop laughing: this was a big revelation for me!

I cruised up the same hill that nearly killed me on The Raleigh.

It just looks less steep, doesn’t it? I don’t think they’ve regraded the hill since I last rode it, though I suppose anything is possible. This photo, unlike the last one, is actually taken from the top. I didn’t have to stop halfway up. I won’t say it was a breeze, but it was easily doable.

Mind blown, I made my way happily on to Bellevue, thinking I might head over to the Whole Foods, sit and have something featuring too much organic quinoa. Instead, when I reached the sign indicating the trailhead to the I-90 trail, I paused. I considered the dwindling supply of water in my rather ridiculous water bottle (borrowed from my son), the fact that it was noon and all I’d eaten that day were two slices of toast spread with goat cheese, and that Seattle was over nine miles away. All things considered, I should probably have put the bridge off again.

But I wasn’t tired. Not even a little. Besides, though the sign said the bridge ride was over nine miles, how bad could that really be? I had driven that bridge a thousand times, and in my mind, it was a nice flat ribbon across the water, with a pretty island in the middle. Like that bridge out to Key West in the movies, you know? But with fewer palm trees and a lot less Jimmy Buffet.

After only a moment’s hesitation, I turned The Gazelle and headed under the freeway through the Mercer Slough, a wetland preserved by building the bridge above it. It took me about five seconds to question the wisdom of my decision.

Yes, it’s really that steep. But it’s just a cute little bridge, right? No big deal. I’m sure the rest of the ride will be flatter.

The slough itself is a green and shady oasis under the pillars, replete with reeds, herons and horsetails.

The slough quickly transitioned to another hill, this one leading me up onto the bridge itself. I was there!

I was unprepared for the volume of the traffic noise. I-90 is one of the busiest freeways in America, and this bridge, even at noon on a Tuesday, is heavily used. I’m not sure what I expected the sound to be like on the bridge, but really, nothing could have prepared me for that ridiculous roar.

There were compensatory elements, however…

The views heading in Seattle’s direction were certainly pretty. That’s Mercer Island up ahead. It’s a bit of a rich-man’s enclave. A small island less than five miles from a major metropolitan area, with more than a lot of waterfront property, all of which costs a freakin’ fortune. Who’d have thunk it?

One of the many things I hadn’t noticed when driving this route was how long Mercer Island actually is. I crossed the short span between Bellevue and the island and was soon cruising along the wide back street bike paths. And cruising. And cruising. Really, Mercer Island has always seemed like a brief blip as a bridge-driver, but it’s a good four miles across. And I swear, it’s entirely uphill, both ways. Halfway across, I crested what seemed like the thirtieth gigantic incline to find my salvation: a bathroom!

I didn’t actually need to avail myself of the facilities all that badly; I was sweating up a storm by this point, so what I really needed was the water fountain.

Except that the water fountain was more of a water dribbler. I couldn’t fit my water bottle under the stream without laying the bottle completely on its side, totally defeating the purpose as I sloshed half the water right back out. I tried the faucets at the bathroom sinks, but these too produced weak streams that slid down the back of the faucets and along the side of the sink. I’ve never seen more pathetic water faucets, actually, that could still be considered “working.” So, with only half a water bottle refill possible, I snapped a quick Obligatory Bathroom Self-Portrait, and headed back on the road. Note my expression of grim determination and sacrifice.

Actually, I wasn’t that annoyed. I figured I could do the half-refill again if necessary on the return trip.

Finally, another mile or so of struggling up yet another hill, and there it was: the main portion of the I-90 bridge!

Dear god, I’d forgotten about the grades on either end!

And no, going down the hill wasn’t any better than going up. You see, one small problem had developed on this ride with The Gazelle’s recent upgrades. The brakes squeak. Okay, it’s more than that. They shriek. Actually, it’s more like an ear-splitting high-pitched banshee wailing death scream.

I’m not easily embarrassed by my ancient bike quirks, but holy mother of heaven, are those brakes ridiculously humiliating. I actually thanked some minor deities for the tremendous grind of the near-by vehicles.

The I-90 Bridge: Where No One Can Hear Your Brakes.

About mid-span, after surviving another round of the screaming furies that had alighted on my Mafics, I found myself awed by the beauty of Lake Washington on a sunny day.

How often can you ride over a boat? Seriously, that’s an exciting milestone! I was grinning from ear to ear as I pumped up the final hill to the top of the bridge and out onto the nearest vantage point.

Look, Gazelle Champion Mondial, you just rode that!

I think The Gazelle is too embarrassed by its little brake problem to take any pleasure in the ride.

We did a triumphant little happy dance (okay, I did a triumphant little happy dance, mostly internally) and then turned around to head back.

The views on the return trip were even more beautiful. That’s Bellevue in the foreground, backed by the supporting chorus of the Cascade foothills. On my right was a very majestic Mount Rainier, who was looking a bit too hazy to show up in photographs. Also, stopping to take a picture on this bridge was tough, as the trail is very narrow and mostly used by speeding roadies in lots of lycra. Timing my photos to avoid being hit by a guy burning down the hill at 30 miles an hour was tricky enough that I only tried it on the way out, not on the return. I can’t imagine how crazy it is during the commute!

At any rate, after about six hundred hills and more than a few times when I had to stop on the way down to give my ears a rest (not kidding), I arrived back at my car in Renton (I have to drive to the trailhead for this ride, as I live at the top of a hill that would make the bridge ride look like a walk in a very flat park). I was starving. The wee saddlebag I’m borrowing from The Raleigh barely fits my camera, phone and a credit card, without any room for things like sustenance. But other than the fact that I was nearly deaf and harrowed by hunger, I was fine. I could, in fact, have ridden much further, had I brought… you know, food and water.

Even stranger… my butt, normally the source of much of my long-distance misery, was fine. The well-loved Brooks on The Gazelle Champion Mondial is actually broken in, a concept I find almost frightening in its unfamiliarity. My hands, also a pressure point, were just fine. I did a quick calculation in my head and realized that I had just completed my longest ride, ever. Thirty-six or so miles, about ten miles further than I have ever ridden on The Raleigh. And the best part? It took me just half an hour longer than my last round-trip to Bellevue, even though I’d added another EIGHTEEN miles.

I can’t even wrap my head around all this. I realize the rest of you probably don’t find the idea that The Raleigh is a slow, heavy bike that astonishing, but I do. I think of it as my cute little workhorse, but the idea that it might not be suited to long rides never even occurred to me. I have honestly thought of the problem as one of my own fitness, not one related to my choice of transport. Call me dumb and slap me silly.

In the days after this monumental event, I have realized several important things: different bikes are suited for different routes (again, stop laughing. I’m serious!); I’m not as out of shape as I always think I am; and finally, I need that saddlebag before I do this again. If I’d had say… a bigger breakfast, and a banana and an energy bar in my bag, as well as more water, I’d have been able to do another twenty or so miles, perhaps even more. THIS BLOWS MY MIND.

I think I’ve crossed a metaphorical bridge, as well as a physical one. But don’t worry: I won’t be writing to you in a year from my carbon-fiber modern road bike with brifters, describing my latest high-speed century. The Raleigh isn’t perfect, but it’s my kind of screwy. I love having a faster, lighter ten-speed, but I have no desire to start road racing. I’m still a vintage bike kind of gal, and that’s never going to change. What I have now are options, and admittedly, a few new goals. And that is never a bad thing!

Really, this isn’t a ride report. It’s more like a dip into the ride report pool. On Wednesday of last week, realizing that I had less than an hour to ride, I took The Gazelle Champion Mondial down to the Cedar River Trail and rode like the wind! Okay, not that fast, but it felt fast to me. I was able to do about 17 miles in just over 45 minutes, which is pretty speedy compared to my ride speeds on The Raleigh, or god forbid, the other Gazelle.

I took just three photos, one of which is of the new handlebar wraps, so folks could see them.

Riding this bike is addictively fun. In fact, today I took my longest, hardest ride ever and it was amazing (more on that ride later). So I think it’s safe to say that this bike has won me over, and you’re all going to have to bear with excessive Gazelle Champion Mondial raving for a while. I know, we all miss The Raleigh, but when I fall, I fall hard. And I am definitely in a honeymoon period with this bike.

Here are my three Cedar River Trail photos. Stay tuned for the longer, more exciting ride report coming soon!

… Because I’ve taken too many rides to report them all! Seriously. SO MANY RIDES.

And why not? I have a freakishly beautiful bike to take them on!

So let’s start at the beginning.

This bike is really beautiful, as I have noted several times before (ehem). The gold color is not flashy, but is almost more yellow than gold. It has a light gold fleck in the paint that makes it a bit sparkly, but especially for the 1970’s, it’s surprisingly subtle.

The bad news on the paint is that it’s super delicate. The slightest scratch is a major ding. I know that some vintage bikes have less paint adherence than others, and it appears this one has some issues in that regard. Well, must treat it delicately…

While riding it hard.

The other features it came with are great: working front and rear dynamo (though the amount of light produced is not exactly blinding), bottle holder, bell, rack and gorgeous full fenders with white tail.

It’s a ten speed, with Simplex derailleur and shifters, and Dura Ace cranks. The shifting is friction, not indexed, which means I have to play a bit to get it into gear. Really, it should have bar-end shifters, as doing this on an upright bike is a bit ridiculous (meaning I really don’t shift much), but eh… so far, I’m okay with it as it is.

In terms of things that needed replacing… the tires are the original Dutch gumwalls, though they’re more red than modern gumwalls (and I love them. I’ll be very, very sad to replace them for this very reason). They’re 700cc, so I’m hoping that somewhere out there will be a beautiful set of reddish gumwalls to take their place when the time comes. The pedals had cages, so they came off and were replaced with MKS Sylvans, which I’ve had on other bikes in the past. They’re relatively inexpensive, and work well, plus I think they look a bit more vintage than some of the other options out there. At first, the pedals were the only modifications the bike needed, as everything else worked beautifully. Even the Brooks is somewhat broken-in (which is a bonus, as my butt seems incapable of breaking them in otherwise).

The bike does need its own saddlebag (I just informed The Handsome Man that this is what he’s getting me for my birthday next month). I don’t like riding it with the basket. Frankly, the basket feels clunky and heavy on a bike like this. The Raliegh’s wee saddlebag, while reasonably functional, is just too small to hold my camera and other gear. I need a medium-sized bag. I’m thinking one of the very small Carradices.

The first few rides on this bike were a revelation: I was so fast! Put a bit of pedal to the metal and off I went, like a yellow rocket (or a comparatively fast rocket, next to The Raleigh or The Gazelle Trimsport). The bike is astonishingly smooth, and very responsive without being twitchy. It corners particularly well and seems to have a nice balance. It’s not light, nor is it heavy. The Reynolds tubing seems to just absorb vibrations and allow for clean riding. I can’t explain that any other way.

My only issue was, of course, the level of uprightness I could achieve. This is a large bike. I couldn’t, honestly, ride something any larger. The top tube is literally uncomfortably high if I hold it fully upright and stand over it. I just hope I’m graceful as I hop on. Something like this…

So as you might imagine, the long stem and low, short bars were a tough combination for me. I could tell, just from how I wanted to sit, that I needed to come up and back a bit for this bike to work. In some ways, that was a shame, as the slightly more aggressive posture (again, more aggressive than I’m used to, but comparatively unaggressive) was part of the fun. My hands did not think the experience should be all about aggression, however.

This required some serious bike-thinking on my part. I knew, first of all, that the horrid cheap black dirt bike grips had to go. But after that? Here was my dilemma: the bike has a lovely forged stem, but dang, is it a LOOOONG stem. I didn’t measure, but I would guess 120mm, as The Shogun has a similar length to its stem, and it’s 120mm. The Gazelle Champion Mondial, however, also had ugly old aluminum bars that were the most beat-up part of the bike. So while I could have just swapped out a stem, it seemed a shame to lose the pretty stem and keep the ugly bars.

The answer? Nitto Northroads in that shiny aluminum stuff (name is escaping me). Got them at a local bike shop, then dithered over making an appointment to bring the bike back in for the following week to have them installed. Went for a ride. The bike managed to throw the chain off and get it stuck inside the derailleur. A local hero helped me in a manly fashion, but I was worried I’d done something to the bike, and since I was on the Burke Gilman trail…

I rolled it the mile or so back to Counterbalance Bicycles. The nice gentlemen there checked it for me and ascertained that the derailleur was fine. Then we talked bars. I realized I was going to need to add extra brake cable for the new Nittos to work, so I made an appointment with them for the following week, and brought it in. They turned it around in a day, and we went through grip options when I picked it up. I tried some molded modern clamp-on grips, but they were a: ugly and b: uncomfortable, so I ended up with some gel pads and cork gel tape. I really like the new look (I know, I ordered some red rubber grips from Amazon a while back… stay tuned on those. They’ll be a give away!).

The Nittos are very wide, compared to the old bars (chromoly! That’s what they are! I knew I’d remember!), but they’re also longer, and slope up slightly. This solved my positioning problem nicely. And since they’re beautifully shiny, they make me happier in that way, too. They aren’t aggressive, but the bike still feels fast to me, and my hands don’t hurt (as much), so that’s all okay.

They’re a completely different shape from the vintage Northroads on The Raleigh. Interesting. But they work for this bike.

So how does it ride now? Wonderfully. It’s still smooth and fast and handles perfectly. I do feel more like I’m cruising and less like I’m racing, but in the end, comfort won. Now… for more rides! MORE!

So I have been riding, but not writing reports (they’re coming). The Gazelle Champion Mondial is all done, with new bars and tape and it’s amazing! I will write more soon, but here are a couple photos of the bike and another of the gorgeous painted Crane bells I saw today at Counterbalance Bicycles.